Creating a New School of Informatics, Engineering and Technology

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School of Computing, Engineering and Information
Sciences
Professor Fary Z. Ghassemlooy Associate Dean
(Research)
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Contents

• Introduction
• Research Groups
• Selected Research Areas
• Who To contact

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Northumbria University

• A new modern university, committed to research
  and technology transfer.
• Research encompasses a wide range of activities,
  developed and fostered within the context of the
  academic framework, business environments and
  market needs.
• 9 Schools
• 21 Research Centres, and many research groups
• 40 of staff are research active
• Over 500 PhD
• Strong industrial links

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School of Computing, Engineering and Information
Sciences

• Has a strong research culture working regionally,
  nationally and internationally, with universities
  and industries such as, Siemens, Agilent, CISCO,
  Atmel, Roche, Rolls Royce, Vickers, British Army,
  Jawaby Oil (Libya), and others.
• 35-40 of staff are active researcher
• 20 Post-doctoral Research Fellows
• Over 80 PhD students
• 6 Research groups

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Research Groups

• Energy Systems and Material
• Manufacturing and Design
• Intelligent Modelling Lab.
• Information, Knowledge and Systems
• Northumbria Communications Research Lab.
• Learning and Teaching

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Energy Systems and MaterialProfessor N Pearsal

• Multi-disciplinary research centred on
• Photovoltaics (through
• Northumbria Photovoltaics
• Applications Centre NPAC)
• Wind power generation
• Integration of renewable
• energy into the electrical network
• Flexible AC transmission systems
• Nanotechnology
• Surface modification
• Bio-material

Supported by EPSRC Landscape 6/7FP
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Photovoltaics at Northumbria

• NPAC undertakes a wide range of research
  activities in photovoltaics and has a particular
  reputation in
• the development of thin film solar cells based on
  compound semiconductors (CuInSe2 and related
  compounds)
• thermophotovoltaic devices and systems
• the measurement and analysis of solar cell
  performance
• monitoring and analysis of PV system performance
  (particularly for building integrated systems)
• environmental impact and life cycle analysis for
  energy systems, particularly PV cells and modules

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NPAC SuperGen ProjectPV Materials for the 21st
Century

• Funded by the UK Engineering and Physical
  Sciences Research Council (4.5 million)
• Consortium of six UK universities
• Bangor, Bath, Durham, Loughborough,
• Northumbria, Southampton
• Part of the SuperGen series of projects looking
• at future energy sources and infrastructure
• Northumbria works closely with Bath University on
  the synthesis of PV materials in the chalcopyrite
  family (CuInSe2 and related compounds) using low
  cost and environmentally friendly techniques
• Facilities at Northumbria include material
  deposition by electron beam and sputtering
  techniques, spectroscopy, SIMS and XRD analysis,
  together with cell measurement equipment

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Nano- and Micro-structured PVD Coatingson
Coronary Stents Dr J. Burnell-Gray

• To achieve
• continued high adhesion surface feature size
• compatible mechanical properties
• Base to build drug anchoring technology

Typical size 2-4 mm diam X 20mm long

• Made in stainless steel (AISI 316L), NiTi or
  CoCr
• Inserted by catheter, crimped on a balloon tip
• Expanded in place by saline pressure

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Magnetron Sputtering System
With Closed-Field Unbalanced Magnetron
Technology Teer Coatings patent
High plasma density large effective plasma
volume ? BETTER COATINGS
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Procedure - Coating Characterisation

• Scanning Electron Microscopy(SEM) examination
  before and after coating
• Nanoindentation for hardness, modulus, and
  topography - Mapping of hardness H and Modulus, E
  on 10 micron Square of polished

Hardness H, TiN to 25GPa
Modulus E TiN to 250GPa
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Topography Different conditions different
grain size by AFM Scan area 1µm x 1µm
Run 4327, 1micron TiN, Ra 3nm Peak
height 50nm
Run 4322, 5micron TiN, Ra 13nm Peak
height 200nm
Run 4316, Multilayer Ti/TiN , 3micron, Ra
22nm Peak height 200nm
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Northumbria Communications Research Lab Prof. F
Z Ghassemlooy

• Research Areas
• Photonics
• All optical switches and router
• Optical wireless communications
• Microwave Holography and Ellipsometry
• Microwave Communications
• Digital Signal Processing
• Control and Instrumentation Systems

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Photonics Applications

• Photonics in communications expanding and
  scaling

Long-Haul
Metropolitan
Home access
Board -gt Inter-Chip -gt Intra-Chip
Photonics diffusing into other application
sectors
Health(bio-photonics)
Environment sensing
Security imaging
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All- Optical Router
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Optical Switch
TOAD
Switch to Pulse-positions Actual PP frame (length 2N slots)
Port 1 (1,3,,2N-1)
Port 2 (0,,2N-2)
Port 3 (2,)
PPM-ACM module
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Communication Systems The Last km and m
Backbone network
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Dual-polarized AntennasDr. Steven Gao

• Polarization diversity in mobile communications
• to reduce multi-path fading effects
• Frequency re-use in wireless communications
• two orthogonal polarizations at receiver
  transmitter
• Automotive radar

• Features and Specifications
• Low cost (single patch)
• Attractive for active phased arrays
• Bandwidth 1.84 GHz-2.18 GHz,
• gt17 (single patch)

• More space in feed
• Isolation lt-32 dB
• Cross-polar. levels
• lt-18 dB.

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Broadband CP active antenna (with class-E PA)

• RHCP
• High efficiency PAEgt50 over 17 BW
• Broadband AR value ARlt3 dB over 9 BW
• Low cost (PCB technology)

Back view of antenna
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Microwave Holographic ImagingDr. David Smith

• Applications
• Microwave Antenna Testing
• Concealed Weapons Imaging
• Medical Imaging
• Non-destructive Testing
• Aerospace Applications
• Alternative to Ground Probing Radar

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Microwave Dish Antenna Testing

• Simple and inexpensive method for determining
  radiation patterns of antennas and reconstructing
  aperture fields

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Concealed Weapons Imaging

• Microwaves can penetrate clothing and produce
  image of concealed objects
• Non-ionising and completely safe at low power
  levels
• Provide good resolution and low cost

Reconstructed Image from Holographic Measurements
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Medical Imaging - Breast Phantoms with simulated
tumour
Images of Simulated Tumour within Breast Phantom
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Intelligent Systems

• The research of the group is interdisciplinary
  and includes expertise in mathematics, statistics
  and computing, with research interest in
• Mathematical physics
• Mathematical and statistical methods of
  bioinformatics
• Mathematical biology
• Artificial intelligence
• Image processing
• Data warehousing
• Data mining and intelligent systems
• Data modelling, analysis, and management

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Intelligent Systems

• Group Members
• Prof. Maia Angelova (Applied Mathematics)
• Dr Patrick Jemmer (Applied Mathematics)
• Dr John Jackson (Applied Mathematics, ERF)
• Dr Dave Giddings (Statistics, consultancy)
• Dr Akhtar Ali (Computing)
• Dr Joe Faith (Computing)
• Dr Jeremy Ellman (Computing)
• Jon Riley (Image Data, RA)

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• Research Expertise
• Maia Angelova
• mathematical physics
• group-theoretical and algebraic methods
• applications to condensed matter physics,
  molecular physics, spectroscopy, crystallography
  and materials
• mathematical and statistical methods of
  bioinformatics
• mathematical biology
• data mining and intelligent systems

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• Patrick Jemmer
• numerical simulation
• computational solutions
• quantum and physical chemistry
• mathematical biology
• John Jackson
• cosmology
• inverse problems
• medical imaging

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• Dave Giddings
• operational research
• regression analysis, time series
• multivariate analysis
• Akhtar Ali
• data warehousing
• data modelling
• performance analysis, string processing
• Joe Faith
• artificial intelligence
• computer vision

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INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS
Fullerene packing on a 3D lattice
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Protein-molecule simulation with reaction at
active sites
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3D-visualisation tool clustering of gene
expression data
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Information, Knowledge and Systems
E-Records Management Dr Julie McLeod and
colleagues have been granted 360k to investigate
issues relating to the management of electronic
records
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Manufacturing and Design

• Research in manufacturing includes metal cutting
  machining and machinability particularly with
  multi-point cutting edges, supported by active
  international industrial collaborators. Further
  research interests associated with the above is
  in the application of advanced surface
  engineering technologies to cutting edges and
  tooling.
• The group also have expertise in code development
  and use of CFD software. Current research
  interests include application of CFD software for
  designing ventilation systems in industrial and
  environmental applications, fluid flow and heat
  transfer in electronic packaging, analysis of
  transonic flow and non-Newtonian fluid flow
  processes.

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Who to Contact

• Professor Z. (Fary) Ghassemlooy
• Tel [phone], Email
  fary.ghassemlooy_at_uun.ac.uk
• Professor Nicola Pearsal
• Tel [phone]. Email
  nicola.pearsal_at_unn.ac.uk
• Professor M Angelova
• Tel [phone]. Emailmaia.angelova_at_unn.
  ac.uk
• Professor Mohammed Sarwar
• Tel[phone], Email
  Mohammed.sarwar_at_unn.ac.uk
• Dr David Wainwright
• Tel [phone], Email
  david.wainwright_at_northumbria.ac.uk

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• Thank you!